Gilgandra Shire Council (GSC) have taken home the Highly Commended Award at the 2025 NSW Local Government (LG NSW) Excellence Awards, for their project ‘Future-Proofing Aged Care and Disability Services in Gilgandra’.
On Thursday, 5 June 2025, Director Aged Care and Disabilities Donna Dobson, Cr Nick White and Executive Assistant Julie Prout attended the LG NSW Awards Dinner as category finalists for the Special Project Initiative – Under 50k Population category.
The highly commended project was a result of workforce skills shortage and difficulty recruiting in our regional and remote location, impacting on Gilgandra Lifestyles’ and Orana Living’s ability to recruit and retain staff. The consistent vacant positions in an already difficult to fill industry was further overstretched by the Royal Commission enforcing the requirement for staff ratios.
GSC took the initiative to look beyond borders and partnered with Groworx, a skilled workforce solutions company for Healthcare Providers to assist in providing a staffing solution. After months of preparations, Gilgandra welcomed the arrival of 16 care workers from the Philippines in late 2023 and early 2024 to start their employment with GSC’s Aged Care and Disability Services. The staff were a mix of overseas trained registered nurses and care workers, arriving on student visas and in the final stages of completing a certificate III in Aged Care with an Australian training organisation.
Director Aged Care & Disabilities, Donna Dobson, says, “This partnership with Groworx and recruitment of new staff from Philippines has been remarkable, not only in terms of financial outlay, but also in the service, program and procedures delivery across our Aged Care and Disability services. The full complement of staff has also met our legislative requirements, ensuring our services provide the level of care our clients expect and deserve.”
“Our new staff members are joyful, caring and have a fantastic work ethic, developing genuine and wonderful relationships with residents, fellow staff members, and the wider community. Furthermore, with a full roster staff morale has also improved, we have fewer staff turnover and there is improved enjoyment in our facilities”.
“We are honoured to have been recognised as finalists for the LG Awards, and take home the Highly Commended award for this category. A fantastic outcome for a crucial workforce project, one that will continue to evolve, to meet the needs of the workforce as well as the future needs of our ageing population.”
